


it is the nature of desire not to be satisfied

by kaijuburgers



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: (because demons), Age Difference, Blasphemy, Boss/Employee Relationship, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Dubious Consent, F/M, Fantasizing, Femdom, Temptation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:55:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25248769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaijuburgers/pseuds/kaijuburgers
Summary: “Do you covert your Knight-Commander, Knight Captain?”A desire demon comes to Cullen wearing the form of Meredith Stannard.
Relationships: Cullen Rutherford/Meredith Stannard, Desire Demon(s)/Cullen Rutherford
Comments: 9
Kudos: 18
Collections: Black Emporium 2020





	it is the nature of desire not to be satisfied

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kauri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kauri/gifts).



> This fic was written for [The Black Emporium Exchange 2020](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/BlackEmporium2020)

The demon’s voice is smooth as honey and twice as sickly sweet, and Cullen knows exactly what is happening to him. The last time he’d met with a desire demon, temptation had looked very different. She’d been tall and willowy, so frail looking that Cullen had sometimes wondered if the wind could blow her off her feet. He’d wondered plenty of other things about her too, what the texture of her dark hair would be if he carded his hands through it, what it would be like to kiss her, first on the lips and then down onto her pale neck, if she’d moan under his touch the way he’d imagined Amell doing. 

The demon hadn’t been his Amell, but she had been her at the same time, the same slender figure, the same bright eyes, the same teasing smile. She had been a perfect facsimile, toying with stray curls of hair between her fingers exactly the way Amell did, each freckle that dusted her skin- pale from the lack of sun in Kinloch Hold- placed exactly where Amell’s were. But she had been beyond perfect too, smelled like vanilla and spices, the way Cullen imagined Amell smelling rather than the way she actually did. Her hands had been soft, but they had been soft as silk, not like the staff-calloused hands Amell actually had. Cullen had wanted to breath her in, to let her intoxicate him, and she’d given him exactly what he wanted. Until she hadn’t.

This time, temptation does not look like his Amell. Where she had wrapped herself in soft cloth vestments, dark curls of her hair bouncing with each step, this time temptation comes to him in armour plated, golden curls like a halo around her. A lump catches in Cullen’s throat.  The demon damn near purrs when she speaks.

“Do you covert your Knight-Commander, Knight Captain?” 

Cullen feels himself pull into parade rest, both because he is too well trained to slouch in front of his Knight Commander and because there is a part of him that believes his stiff military posture can form a barrier to the creature. It’s a futile manoeuvre and he knows it, but there is still a part of him that hopes this time he can resist. She seems to float when she moves- too otherworldly, too divine for her feet to make contact with the ground as she moves closer to him. Just as the last demon Cullen faced was a more perfect than perfect version of Amell, so too is this one a more perfect than perfect version of Meredith, of his Knight-Commander.

She reaches an armoured hand out to him, palm down, and for a moment Cullen wants nothing more than to get on his knees and kiss it. He wants to ask her what she would have him do, tell her he would do anything for her. Meredith rarely praises him, but there’s something so good and right about just being given a commandment and fulfilling it that Cullen doesn’t mind. Cullen has always been a religious man- even if he does not say the Chant as often as he should- and all he can think is that the woman in front of him looks like Andraste incarnate. He would follow her into the Black City. He would follow her anywhere.

And then he remembers himself. He remembers his training. And for a moment, he sees the demon as she truly is. Her skin has the sickly purple-blue tiny of a fresh corpse and a nest of black horns curl from her forehead. His lips pull back in a snarl that exposes his teeth as he pulls his longsword from its scabbard, holding it in long plow position, so pulled back that the hilt is past his hip. Cullen’s Templar training was long and intense and as a result he holds the position perfectly, the long edge of the sword facing down, ready to strike at her if she approaches.

“You are not my Knight-Commander,” he says, and he near spits the words at her.

Cullen’s Templar training may have taught him swordplay to perfection, but they never taught him how to respond to a situation like this. With each step towards him, he finds himself forgetting what he saw of her true form. She commands space just as his Knight-Commander does, looks at him with those icy eyes in exactly the way his Knight-Commander does, and as she nears him he finds it harder and harder to take a breath.

"I _am_ your Knight-Commander.” She speaks the words with the same power that Meredith does, states them as if they are the most plain thing in the world and Cullen is a fool for not understanding. Despite himself- despite knowing that this creature is not her- Cullen finds himself flushing with shame. He cannot meet her gaze. “Do your duty, to the Chantry and to me.”

Cullen does not feel his sword fall from his grasp but it must do, because he hears a sound as it hits the ground and the demon steps ever closer to him. He cannot take his eyes off the stark, cruel shape of her cupid’s bow. With every movement, he wants her to have him more. It is the magic, he knows, that intoxicating magic that will feel like cloyingly sweet perfume when he comes to his senses.

“Please." His mouth is dry and his voice almost a whisper. “Forgive me. _Please_.”

She kisses him exactly how Cullen had thought that his Knight-Commander would kiss him. She is rough and demanding and he surrenders under her touch. She smells of leather and incense, and he realises referring to her as his Knight-Commander is wrong. She isn’t his, he is hers.

“Command me,” he says after they have broken the kiss. “I know it is not my place to ask, but command me. _Please_.”

She gestures to the ground, never breaking her steely gaze.

Cullen would be a liar if he said he hadn’t thought about this, if when he’s in his quarters and Samson is asleep Cullen doesn’t turn his thoughts to the Knight-Commander. He can’t pretend that he doesn’t bury his face in the pillow to muffle the sound of his moans at night, that he hasn’t worried that Meredith’s name has slipped from his lips just a little too loudly despite that. The truth is that Knight-Commander Meredith makes him feel weak and she is the one person who makes weakness feel comfortable. Around her, it is not his place to question, it is not his place to argue. He is part of something much larger than himself and he knows it.

Cullen feels small even before he gets to his knees.

**Author's Note:**

> i'd never really thought about cullen/meredith before, but saw this as a request and i am _into it_ in all its power dynamic-y messyness. you did say you were unsquickable, so i went with a demon!meredith/cullen situation bc that is very much my kind of dirtybadwronghot


End file.
